


Unrestrained

by 221b_hound



Series: Unkissed [11]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Consensual, Desire, M/M, New Year's Resolutions, Restraints, Rimming, Sherlock Experiments on John, With John's complete consent, mild bondage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-30
Updated: 2013-12-30
Packaged: 2018-01-06 10:17:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,377
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1105624
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/221b_hound/pseuds/221b_hound
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Another experiment in desire - it's not just what about what Sherlock likes to experience, but what he likes to do. It turns out that it's much more about who he likes to do it to, and the way John's desire has become bound up with restraint.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unrestrained

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AtlinMerrick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AtlinMerrick/gifts).
  * Translation into 中文 available: [无拘无束](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3715273) by [shawnordaisy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shawnordaisy/pseuds/shawnordaisy)



> I dedicate this work to Atlinmerrick, because of her own dedication to the fine art of rimming and the joy it brings to fictional and actual real life human beings (and fanfic writers and readers) everywhere.

Sherlock had suggested there would be another experiment in exploring the map of his desires on New Year’s Day. The aim, he said, was to examine what he liked to _do_ , rather than what he liked to _have done_.

John was all aboard with that idea. He had a suggestion of his own to make, however, designed to make things easier for Sherlock to maintain control. Sherlock was not exactly surprised, and confirmed their usual parameters. No anal penetration. When someone said stop, everything stopped immediately, pending further negotiaton or complete cessation.

“Of course,” said Sherlock, “I will be monitoring your responses. I’ll know if you are experiencing discomfort or otherwise not enjoying the process.”

John failed to present an appropriately science-oriented mien. The twinkle in his eye was a dead giveaway. But he knew that his own responses were a key part of the experiment. “Bear in mind that on some of those occasions, I might just be… adjusting. Ask me before you stop completely, unless I tell you to. Fine?”

“Eminently.”

“Then here,” John gathered up the remaining spool of wide, red nylon ribbon they’d used to decorate the Christmas presents and handed it over, “Where do you want me?”

“Your old bed has a more suitable frame.”

“All right.”

John was already half hard, which he knew wasn’t the point, really, but he knew that Sherlock would understand. His body responded how it responded, to Sherlock’s voice, his touch, his _ideas,_ damnit. If he got uncomfortably aroused, they’d take a break, unless together they decided otherwise.

It was all good. All _wonderfully fine_.

Step one took fifteen minutes, as John showered and cleansed himself thoroughly.

Steps two and beyond took place in John’s old upstairs bedroom. John unwrapped the towel from his waist and lay naked on the bed, his skin soft and warm from his shower.  John wondered if he’d been _too_ thorough – he was oversensitised already, and realised he smelled of the sage and lemon body wash he’d used.

“Sorry about the scent,” he said as he positioned himself on the mattress, “I know you prefer more natural scents. I just.... I wanted to be…”

“Perfect,” Sherlock finished for him, dropping a kiss onto John’s sternum. “It’s fine. It’s not overpowering. Stop fretting. I suspect a better balance will be achieved once we’ve been here a short while. Perspiration,” he elaborated succinctly as he fixed a length of wide red ribbon around John’s wrist and attached it to the bedhead. There was a little give, providing some manoeuvrability. Sherlock kissed John’s nose next. “And I appreciate your stringency with your ablutions.”

John relaxed as Sherlock wrapped another red ribbon around his left wrist and attached it to the bedhead. There was even more give in this one, so that his shoulder wouldn’t cramp. The idea was not, after all, to make him uncomfortable or even fully immobile.

“All right?”

John pulled gently on the festive restraints. “That’s fine. Can you shift the pillow?”

Sherlock lifted John’s head carefully and moved the pillow until they were both satisfied that John was properly supported and relaxed.

John settled and looked down his naked body at Sherlock, in dark trousers but shirtless, who was busy wrapping wide red ribbons around John’s ankles. Sherlock was careful not to pull John’s legs too far apart, because that wasn’t the point either.

“You can spread them a bit further, if you like,” said John anyway, “It’ll make it more difficult for me to get leverage.”

Sherlock considered this. “I don’t want you to feel you have no control at all.”

John considered _that_. “Well, I can snap the ribbons here,” he tugged on the ones at his wrist, “If I really need to. It’s not like this ribbon is designed to keep anyone imprisoned. I know I can get out if I need to. That’s fine. But it’s hard to stop my body wanting to… want you… and moving accordingly. This is still about you, sweetheart. I’m okay with it. Spread me out. Elevate my ankles a little, no leverage there… that’s it.”

Sherlock gave him a sly, amused look. “I could deduce how and why you know about this.”

John laughed. “It’s not half as exciting as you’d think.”

Sherlock deduced rapidly: _practical; not intrinsically arousing; attitude and comment suggests a work use; immobilising injured personnel in a similar though not identical manner – likely the restraint technique due to violent psychological response rather than physical injuries; not ideal, however, so a temporary solution to avoid physical injuries in dangerous situations until sedation or other treatment possible; medical and military application, then, not sexual._   He frowned. “John…”

“It’s all good, honeybee, it’s not a trigger. Keep going.”

Sherlock finished the task then stopped to inspect his handiwork.

John, spread-eagled on the bed, wrists with no more than ten inches of give, legs spread wide and ankles slightly elevated where they were anchored near the end of the bed. A limited range of horizontal movement down the length of the bed but very little sideways range, almost no vertical mobility. John, half erect, and toes wriggling in anticipation.

John, breathing evenly and smiling.

“I love you, John,” said Sherlock, “Tell me when you need me to stop.”

“I love you too, Sherlock,” replied John, “Gorgeous honeybumble. I’ll let you know.”

And with that, Sherlock bent to kiss John’s wriggling toes, and John stilled them while Sherlock lipped them.  Sherlock ran his tongue under the joints and between the toes. Nibbled slightly at the littlest, sucked slightly at the largest. He kissed the base of John’s foot – small and compact in contrast to Sherlock’s own long, bony feet. He kissed the arch and the heel – licked the arch briefly, with just the tip of his tongue and John jerked away.

“Ticklish.”

Then Sherlock reached for the notebook he’d put on the mattress and jotted down a note.

John sighed happily. “Can I know?”

Sherlock put his pen down. “Orally pleasing, though my reaction is decidedly more affectionate than aroused.”

“Is it like when I suck your toes?”

“You don’t appear to find that strictly arousing either, your enthusiasm notwithstanding.”

“More like a kid with a boiled sweet, I’d say,” said John, laughing at himself.

“Quite. Not dissimilar, then, I would say. There is a certain oral and emotional pleasure for me and I enjoy the response it elicits in you.”

John wriggled his toes as demonstration of that approving response. “Carry on.”

Sherlock didn’t repeat the performance on John’s other foot. This experiment was about his reactions, not John’s, and he already had notes on how he felt about John’s feet. 

In an echo of the Christmas Day experiment, Sherlock tasted and tested various parts of John’s body. After toes, Sherlock kissed, nuzzled and gently bit John’s calves, knees, thighs. His fingers and the palm of his hand; his nipples, his stomach, his hips. A brief kiss to John's cock and his balls, the inside of his thighs, but Sherlock was not meaning to try John too far, and he already had data about his preferences (in the right mood, he loved to kiss and sometimes lick John there). He did, however, brush his nose alongside John's scrotum, in the crease between leg and abdomen, breathed deeply, smiled and made a detailed note, giving John time to catch his panting breath again.

Sherlock explored methodically and closely – skin over muscle and bone, traced and mapped with fingertips and mouth. The texture of the hair on John's head, up his legs and arms, in his armpits, over his belly, at his groin, and over his arse.

In between each touch and examination, Sherlock stopped and made a note.

Sometimes John laughed, or squirmed because it tickled, or panted in arousal, or hummed in contented pleasure. Sometimes his arms would pull against the mild restraints, his limbs seeking automatically to wrap around Sherlock’s shoulders, his hands to pet Sherlock’s hair, but at the first pressure of the ribbon, John would flex his hands and relax again.

His cock grew harder sometimes, and sometimes wilted a little, without further stimulation to keep it at attention, so that it lay plump against his thigh. Sometimes John’s pelvis tried to thrust up, or grind down into the mattress, anything for movement, but with his legs wide and elevated there wasn’t far for him to go. The anchoring of his wrists made it difficult to use his shoulders and back for leverage either. It only took one or two attempts to move and he would sigh, settle, smile. “All good, honeybun, keep going.”

Soon, Sherlock began to try combinations.

Kiss John’s mouth and rub fingers along his ribs and hip.

Inhale the scent of John’s neck and run his palm feather-light over John’s stomach.

Stroke the edge of John’s scar while whispering “I love you” in his ear.

Bury his nose in the crease of John’s thigh, breathing in his clean, male scent (now almost all John and light perspiration, and only the slightest bit of sage and lemon) then kiss the portion of blond-hair-sprinkled arse he could reach between John’s legs.

Slowly, carefully, Sherlock parted those fuzzed cheeks, dipped a tongue into the clean cleft and licked slowly while John keened and tried to buck and finally said: “Enough, god, precious, god, enough, that’s too…”

Sherlock withdrew rapidly to wait until John could breathe properly again. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorriiiiiiiight, baby,” John crooned, “Fucking magic, that, but… too much. Too… if it gets a tick on your list, we can do that again another time.”

Sherlock leaned up to kiss John’s brow. “Perhaps.”

“All good, gorgeous.  Didn’t expect to like that one so much myself."

“Your aversion to anal remains penetrative rather than… simply haptic.”

John stuck his tongue out to capture a bead of sweat that ran down his lip. “Nothing simple about being haptic with your mouth, sweetpea.”

Sherlock grinned, and bent to kiss the sweat from John’s upper lip. “Shall I stop?”

“Are you finished?" 

“Not yet, but I can stop.”

“Keep going, baby.”

Sherlock kept going. Kissing and tasting. Wrapping his two large, strong hands around John’s limbs and stroking the length of his arms, legs, hands, feet. Stroking those hands down John’s chest and stomach, over his ribs and hips, over his smiling face. Sherlock ran his long fingers through John’s hair, separating the strands.

Briefly, he untied John’s left arm and leg and John allowed Sherlock to roll him onto his side.

Kissing and stroking, then, down John’s back. The nape of his neck; his shoulders, scarred and smooth, the bumps of his spine and the wings of his shoulder blades; his ribs and waist, his buttocks. Careful kissing especially over the sweet arc of his bum. Sherlock ghosted a finger over the cleft but John said “Later, baby, if you like, but it’s still too intense right now. Do you mind?”

“Of course I don’t mind, John.” Sherlock kissed him between the shoulder blades again and once he had done with kissing and stroking all that skin, he eased John onto his back and refastened the ribbons.

A few more touches and kisses, then, interspersed with soft nuzzling against John’s temple. 

When he was done, Sherlock stood at the end of the bed and John gazed along at him (past his once more hard cock, beading pre-cum at the tip).

“Are you still comfortable?” Sherlock asked, “I have a few more notes to make, if you don’t mind, but I can untie you now if you’d rather.”

“I feel terrific,” said John, his skin flushed with pleasure and contentment.

Sherlock nodded and consulted his notes. “To round up,” he said, as though he had reached the end of a lecture, “There is not a part of you I do not like to kiss, or touch, or smell, to one degree or another. My responses tend more towards affection and oral pleasure rather than arousal specifically.”

John grinned as though it was particularly wonderful to be considered such an oral and olfactory treat.

“This is not to say that I don’t have preferences. I very much like to kiss your stomach. You worry too much about having lost muscle tone there. I like the softness over the muscle. The layers of you. Soft and hard. Yes. I like that.”

John blinked, as though the idea that his stomach could be the source of so much pleasure was an entirely new one. Sherlock grinned and stepped closer, so he could lean over to kiss the portion in question, nuzzling his face into the sprinkling of blond hair, the small layer of pudge, until he encountered the sensation of tensed muscles as John laughed, part ticklish, part breathless fondness, at the action.

Sherlock straightened up, trailing his fingers over the skin he’d just mouthed. “Shall I continue?”

“Oh, please, sweetpea, do.”

“I meant with my conclusions.”

“I know.” John grinned. “Carry on.”

Sherlock smiled and carried on. “I love kissing your mouth – we already know about that – but there’s an intensity to having my mouth on your throat, your armpits and your groin – having scent mingled with physical sensation – that is especially gratifying.”

“It is,” agreed John.

Sherlock paused to place steepled fingers against his lips before continuing. “However, I find I respond most intensely to your own intense responses. Licking your nipples is especially pleasing: they change texture most gratifyingly, and your cock responds without being touched at all. You breathe much faster when I touch your neck, your thighs and your feet. When I licked your arse, _oh John_ ,” and here Sherlock’s eyes shone, “Your response to that was _wonderful_. I enjoyed that immensely, though not strictly in the sense that it stimulated the same kind of arousal in me. It doesn’t make me want to have an orgasm. It does make me want to touch you again. You are so very responsive, John.”

John laughed, the tone full of affection. “Well, you do like having an impact." 

“Yes,” Sherlock said, running a hand over John’s bare leg – thigh, knee, calf, ankle – smiling as John shivered and sighed. “I do.”

Then Sherlock looked back at his notes, and John regarded him with soft-eyed amusement.

“So, to recap, while I enjoy touching you, and your response to my touch, my arousal in purely sexual terms,” said Sherlock, looking up, “Is clearly related more specifically to your behaviours and attitudes than to your body, per se.” He snapped the book shut and raised his eyebrows at John. “Although I like your body very much.”

John, still breathing heavily, smiled crookedly. “Do you have a list for that, then? What I do that turns you on?”

“Yes,” said Sherlock.

“I know you like it when I’m, what do you call it, _unnecessarily_ protective.”

“Yes. And necessarily, too. 

John thought of the times Sherlock had wanted orgasms. That night in Manchester. After the fire, but not after the nightmare. “You become aroused when you’re feeling intense emotion, though not all the time. Depends on the circumstances.”

“Yes.” Sherlock’s mouth twitched downward.

“Baby, I am never going to play emotional games with you with the fuck-brained intention of trying to turn you on, if that’s what that little frown was about.”

“I know.” Sherlock smiled again. “Your emotional investment in my welfare is tied too closely to your own libido to make that possible.” He nodded towards John’s crotch, where John’s erection was wilting again. “Whenever there is the suggestion that I am emotionally compromised in that fashion, your body’s hormones mix up their signals.”

Sherlock put the notebook aside and he knelt on the bed between John’s spread legs. He placed a hand on each of John’s thighs and caressed the skin with his thumb.

“Related to my emotional state,” he said, “You are aroused when you are restrained like this. This situation combines your unnecessarily protective streak towards me with your concern that I not be emotionally compromised when we are being physically but not necessarily sexually intimate.”

John blinked.

“You are voluntarily immobile right now, although it is completely within your capabilities to escape these restraints. You choose to submit to them, and you enjoy the way in which your body is reminded to comply with my needs. You protect me from your own desires in this manner, while at the same time serving mine. 

“That’s not a bad thing, is it?”

“What I mean, John, is that in doing so, you are also feeding your own desires. It’s a loop. Restrain yourself from imposing your desires upon me, and your desires grow. Your self-denial is a source of pleasure for you, because you perceive that you are taking care of me.”

“Oh.”  John’s brow creased. His erection flagged further still.

“Oh _John_ ,” Sherlock moved forward on his knees to crouch over John’s body, hands on the mattress on either side of John’s shoulders. “It’s not a bad thing, no. It’s that behaviour which so often, though not exclusively, becomes the source of my arousal.”

“Sherlock…” John squirmed unhappily, “You can untie me. I didn’t mean to make…”

“Sssh, John." 

John shushed, though he still looked worried.

Sherlock nuzzled John’s cheek briefly. “I would like you to remain restrained for a short while longer, if that’s all right, though of course I will untie you if that’s what you want. But. Please. I didn’t mean to upset you. I’m not unhappy. I know you’re not trying to manipulate me, intentionally or otherwise.”

John inhaled deeply, let the air out slowly. “Okay. I’m okay. Go on.”

Sherlock kissed John’s cheek. “I find you especially beautiful when you restrain yourself for me. I have told you this before. When you exercise your willpower on my behalf, and when you relinquish it for me, you are utterly beguiling. Interestingly, the primary manifestation of my arousal in response is that I want to bring you to orgasm. I want to fulfil the loop. Restraint and release. My satisfaction is found in completing the circuit.” He kissed John’s forehead, then, and pulled back to gaze heatedly into John’s eyes. 

John’s breathing was heavier now, his eyes wide and luminous. “Sweetheart…” 

“I’d like to share all of my conclusions with you, before I untie you. It will only take a little longer. Is that all right? There’s a reason.”

“It’s all right. I’m all right, Sherlock.”

“I’d like to kiss you, John, if…” 

John grinned at the echo of another conversation about intimate, intense, indecent kisses. “I made sure I was clean for you, baby. You can kiss me. _Please_ kiss me.”

Sherlock kissed John’s lips, tenderly, sweetly, then pulled back once more. He sat on his haunches, his hands resting on John’s chest, over his ribs. Underneath his fingers, he could feel John’s heart pounding.

“It used to be easy to repress my sexual urges because I had so few of them,” he continued in a low voice, “It is apparent that my experience of physical desire is intrinsically related to emotional connection. Although I had desires, they were formless and without incentive until activated by a strong attachment to an individual. In the past, such attachments were rare and those that were made were fleeting once it was clear that they were unreciprocated or that reciprocation was founded on expectations I could not meet, by either behavioural, physical or intellectual norms.”

John had that look in his eyes, the one he got when he wanted to unnecessarily protect Sherlock from the hurts of his past. It made Sherlock smile fondly. He lowered his head to kiss the centre of John’s chest. “Shh, John. I’m not finished.”

John took a deep breath; gathered calmness to himself.

 _All that restraint. For me,_ thought Sherlock, and it made his heart pound and his desire bloom. 

“My physical responses now are linked, therefore, to _you_ in a fundamental manner – because I love you. With that connection, I want to touch you, and be touched by you, and the impulse to repress such desires has not only diminished, but vanished, now that I know you reciprocate them. While sexual stimulation can often be too intense for me, on those occasions when I choose it – when I am especially emotionally stirred, as you correctly observed – you allow me to focus on the sensation of touching you, experiencing my body in contact with yours without further, overwhelming input. Your consideration of this aspect of my body, my experience of desire, is the single most affecting thing any lover has ever done for me. You are the only one, John, who has ever let me do that. You are the only one who understands that it isn’t meant to be wholly selfish.”

“Oh, baby,” John breathed, his hands moving in the ribbons in an abortive attempt to hold Sherlock. Sherlock bent to lay his cheek high on John’s chest, nudging against him like a cat, and John lifted his head enough to kiss the crown of Sherlock’s curls. “When you want orgasms with me, it feels like… ah, god, this is going to sound so stupid and egotistical…” 

“No it won’t. Tell me.” 

“You respond so strongly to my voice, and my names for you. Whether or not I’m touching you directly, I’m… I’m engaged with you while you touch yourself or move against me. I’m… I’m the focus, and when you focus on me it’s… Christ, it’s like being the centre of the universe. It’s fantastic. Utterly and unconditionally fantastic. And it… it feels like you’re… no, this _does_ sound stupid…”

“Say it anyway.” 

“It’s like you’re… it feels… reverent.” John paused, almost wincing with expectation of being corrected.

“Yes,” murmured Sherlock instead, kissing John’s chest, “Yes, exactly. I worship your body with mine. I need you still so that I can do that without distraction. I know it’s my own orgasm I seek, but…”

John sighed, relieved and suddenly serene, and kissed Sherlock’s hair again. “You give me your pleasure, Sherlock. You… you give up your control, too. You let go of everything and surrender to me. God, sweetheart, my _god_ , it’s beautiful when you do. And if you can only be aroused like that when you _love_ someone, then that’s a hell of a gift. You sweet thing. You precious, scrumptious thing. My honeybee.  And it’s not like you neglect me. The opposite, in fact.” John nuzzled his nose into Sherlock’s hair. “You’re amazing. Absolutely amazing.”

Sherlock’s next breath hitched a little and he looked up, his pale eyes intense and wondering. “The way you love me, John. How can I possibly deserve the perfect way you love me?”

“Numpty,” breathed John, bumping his nose against Sherlock’s, “I don’t know how to love you any other way. I love you with everything I am.”

Sherlock kissed John’s mouth. _His John_. Spread out naked underneath him. Willingly submitting to stillness; embracing self-imposed restraint while giving everything to Sherlock.

The wonder of Sherlock’s life was not that he loved John so profoundly. Surely, John being John and Sherlock being Sherlock, such a response was assured. Sherlock loving John like this was a logical inevitability. 

No. The wonder of Sherlock’s life was twofold: that John could love _him_ like that in return; and that Sherlock – self-centred, socially oblivious, strange and singular Sherlock – had finally realised what a gift John was, and that he strived to ensure John knew that he was treasured in return. 

“I would very much like to keep you tied like this for a little longer,” whispered Sherlock, “While I bring you to orgasm. Please?”

John’s body compulsively flexed towards Sherlock in a very resounding _Oh, god, yes!_

“Oh, sweetheart, if you’re sure…”

“I am sure,” Sherlock kissed John’s lips, “I am so sure.” He kissed John’s chest and stomach. “I want to indulge your pleasure loop, John. You have given me your restraint; let it go for me, now. The ribbons will hold you sufficiently. You’ll like that.”

John sigh-moaned and his legs tensed, though without leverage he still couldn’t move far.     

He would definitely like that.

“I want to lick your arse again, if it’s not too much,” Sherlock breathed against his mouth.

John gasped as though Sherlock had already done so. “If you… if you want…if…”

“I want to. God yes. You don’t have to ask now. John. _Listen_. I want you to _tell_ me. We must use our words, you said. Do it. Tell me that you want me to.” 

“Please,” John moaned, and he tried to spread his legs wider, “Lick me, oh fuck, please, lick me, like you just did, that was amazing. _Amazing_. Baby. Please. Just a little. _Please_.”

Sherlock kissed John’s stomach and scooped his hands under John’s backside. He lifted John’s hips a little higher, slotting his shoulders underneath his legs, and dipped his head to kiss John’s inner thighs; his balls, which were already tightening against his body; the mounds of his arse. Sherlock breathed hot and heavy over the sensitive skin. He kissed the surface skin and John wriggled and panted and tried again to spread his legs.

“Ah, ah, ah, ah…” 

“It’s all right, John. You’re allowed to say it. Tell me. Say it. Tell me what you want.”

“Please, baby, _please, please, please_ , oh god, I want to feel your mouth there, I want your tongue against it… god, please, I made myself clean in case, in case you wanted to try, I… you-you-you don’t have to…”

“Sshh, John. Trust me. I will never do anything I don’t want to do, because I know _you_ don’t want that. I won’t ever break the loop. Believe me. _Let go,_ John. My beautiful John.”

“Please, baby, Sherlock, lick me, please please please, your mouth, oh my god, I want to feel your mouth on me…”

Sherlock’s hands still cupped John’s backside. He kissed the surface skin again, and stroked the tensing flesh, then with his thumbs he gently parted John’s cleft and placed gentle kisses, just inside on the smooth, hot skin, left and right.

“Ho-ho-ho-neybeeeeeeeeeeee.”

Sherlock dipped his tongue in to taste again – sage and lemon, and perspiration, and _John_ –to feel the texture of smooth then wrinkled skin, to slide his tongue over the tight pucker; not _in_ (John had been very clear about _in_ ) but over and over and over the creases, the trembling entrance; over such secret, sensitive skin. 

And John bucked in Sherlock’s hands, all restraint but that which was externally imposed relinquished. As best he could, John pushed his arse down into Sherlock’s firm grip, and towards Sherlock’s mouth, and used the leverage of his thighs on Sherlock’s shoulders to spread his legs so wide he felt exposed and free and joyful. He gave up his restraint, all of it, to Sherlock, babbling pet names – _honeybumble_ and _sweetpea_ and _darling_   and _precious_ – and _yes_ and _fuck_ and  _god_. 

With strong, elegant, caressing fingers, Sherlock held John’s arse cheeks open with one hand so he could maintain the slick, rhythmic pressure of his tongue and lips, and the other hand he wrapped around John’s cock, so wet and hard. John keened joyfully as Sherlock licked, stroked, hum-growled a wanton vibration that travelled straight into John’s skin, through the zinging nerves of his arse, through his balls to his straining cock - then he came, shouting, in intense pulses, against his own belly, his chest, in Sherlock’s hair, in his own, he orgasmed so hard.

John lay there panting, quaking, blissful, coming gently down while Sherlock kissed his thighs. Then Sherlock slid carefully up John’s body and placed a soft kiss on his heaving sternum before, still kneeling between John’s legs, he reached back to snatch and snap the Christmas ribbons holding John’s ankles. He lowered John’s legs to the mattress, stroking the muscles, checking for any strain or injury, finding none. He took the towel, hanging over the end of the bed, and wiped down John’s body, and his own hair. He was mildly surprised to realise he felt only smug at the mess. Hair could be washed, after all. A bliss-wrecked John Watson was certainly worth that.

Any time Sherlock’s skin was near, John kissed the air in an exhausted, happy attempt to kiss his honeybee. Sherlock paused to kiss John’s lips, and smiled at the happy hum that resulted, before deftly snapping the ribbons at John’s wrists and freeing him entirely. John automatically draped his arms around Sherlock’s shoulders, though he lacked the energy to hold him more tightly.

Sherlock kissed John’s face all over, tenderly, then he stretched out on the bed and pulled the languid, sated man against his chest.

“Love you,” mumbled John, forming random kisses that only sometimes landed on Sherlock’s skin.

Sherlock gathered him more closely still against his body and stroked John’s shoulders, back, his hair. He encountered ejaculate there, too, and spent a few minutes using a pillowslip to clean that away while John submitted bonelessly to his care.

“You are magnificent,” said Sherlock, kissing John’s forehead.

“Flatterer,” John nuzzled into Sherlock’s throat.

“I don’t just mean your orgasms, John.” 

John laughed. “You good?” he asked after a moment.

“Extremely content,” said Sherlock, tugging the bedspread over them.

For a few moments, they nestled against each other, John dozing, Sherlock listening to him breathe. John snuffled and woke up a little.

“Know my New Year’s resolution, Sherlock?”

“Yes.”

John nipped at Sherlock’s chest. “Bet you don’t.”

“You resolve to work more hours at the hospital and build your savings; and you resolve to return to the gym, which you will do until March, when you’ll take a week off and never go back.”

“Nope.”

“No?”

“It was until yesterday. Changed my mind. I don’t need the gym anymore. I spend my time chasing after you. We’re making money in the consulting business, too, so my hours are fine. Two shifts a week in emergency is plenty to keep my hand in. That’s not about the money anyway. ”

“What is your resolution then?”

“To tell you I love you, every single day of the year, every year for the rest of my life. Reckon that one’s doable. More doable than yours to give up baiting Mycroft.”

“I never resolve to give up baiting Mycroft.”

“See?”

“Notwithstanding that I approve of yours, New Year’s Resolutions are ridiculous. One can resolve to change at any time,” whispered Sherlock against John’s skin, “But if I must have one, it is the one I made when you came home to Baker Street.”

“Hmm?”

“I will be good to you.”

John wrapped his arms tightly around Sherlock. “You are, sweetness, you are.”

“I have been far from good to you, John, but I will be better. I’ll try. I love you, John.”

“Love you, honeybum.”

Sherlock rolled his eyes. “That is a new level of silliness.” But his body, with that pleased-awkward wriggle, gave him away.

“Honeybum, honeybum, honeybum.” John chanted playfully, and cuddled closer in. “Shhh, now. Sleeping.”

And even though Sherlock wanted to get out of bed an hour later, he wanted to be good to John, so he stayed where he was. He did, however, manage to reach his note book, balance it on John’s hip and write at the bottom of his notes, in his usual cryptic shorthand:

 _The map of my desire is written in John’s steady hand._  

Then he got out of bed anyway, because he really did have things to do. He pulled the blanket up over his cartographer’s shoulders, and waited until John’s restless snuffling ceased.

 _Shower. Brush teeth. Wash hair. Burn some more grades of paper for further cataloguing_.

“Love you,” came a mumble from the bed, “Don’t set fire to the kitchen."

Sherlock patted John’s cheek. “If I do, you’ll be the one thing I rescue from the conflagration.”

“Nah, get the Strad,” said John sleepily, “I can shimmy down a drain pipe and meet you outside."

“You are perfect,” said Sherlock, “And an idiot. Go back to sleep."

With a happy huff of air, John burrowed into the sheets and did just that.

After showering, Sherlock took care with the flammable portion of his studies. It wouldn’t do to have John yell at him for letting the Stradivarius burn, after all.

 

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Unrestrained [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7416931) by [Lockedinjohnlock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lockedinjohnlock/pseuds/Lockedinjohnlock)




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